Often, transparencies, i.e., clear or translucent polymeric sheets, are used for the purpose of giving presentations to groups of people. Specifically, transparencies with printed media provided thereon are placed on overhead projectors that shine light through the transparencies so that the media can be projected onto an appropriate viewing surface, such as a screen or wall.
Although transparencies are convenient for sharing information with a group of people, the use of transparencies presents various difficulties that have yet to be addressed both in terms of their printing and their scanning. With respect to printing transparencies, it is easy for the presenter to print media on the transparency that is difficult to see once projected onto the viewing surface. This is particularly the case where the transparencies are created through use of a computing device such as a personal computer (PC). During such creation, the user prepares the transparencies for printing in the same manner in which more standard documents are prepared. Specifically, the user creates a document comprising one or more pages with an appropriate source application such as a word processing application. Once the document is created, the user simply prints the document using transparency sheets as the print media.
The difficulty with transparency creation in the manner described above stems from the fact that the way the document appears when viewed on the user's computing device monitor is not necessarily the way the document will appear when projected onto the viewing surface. This is because image quality is almost invariably poorer when projected as compared to when viewed on a monitor having a high-resolution cathode ray tube which is continually refreshed. In contrast, projection relies upon a light bulb that shines light through drops ink or particles of toner. Therefore, although text may appear large and easy to read on the monitor, it may be too small and therefore difficult to read, once printed on a transparency and projected. In addition, colors that may appear vibrant and easy to see on the monitor may be difficult to see, and sometimes nearly invisible, when projected. Furthermore, while the resolution of various graphics may appear high on the monitor, the resolution may appear poor when projected onto the viewing surface.
Difficulties also arise when scanning previously created transparencies. To cite one example, where relatively low resolution scanning is used to scan the transparencies, a poor electronic version of the transparency may be created. This is particularly true where the transparency has less than ideal resolution to begin with (e.g., where the transparency was created using an ink-based printing device).
In view of the problems identified above, it can be appreciated that it would be desirable to have a system and method for transparency optimization that prevents these difficulties before they occur by aiding the user to optimize transparency printing and/or scanning to obtain desirable results.